The Tale of the Tapes

For reasons I’ll explain at another time, I’ve become quite the tracker of skating book sales. Call it an extension of the days I used to stay glued to American Top 40 on Sunday mornings, which led to studying copies of Billboard at the library every week… but, I digress.

You may have heard that Tonya Harding has a book out. It’s called The Tonya Tapes, and sorry, but I just don’t feel like providing a link to it. Go over to Amazon and check it out if you must. It’s okay. I’ll wait.

So anyway, I wouldn’t bring it up except for three little things:

1) It’s the newest skating-related release on the market.
2) It’s by far the best-selling book about skating at the moment.
3) Tonya didn’t actually write it.

Okay, that last part, while factual, may be misleading. It’s not like Ms. Harding is claiming it to be an autobiography, after all. But while the book clearly shows a different author on the cover, it also claims it’s “The Tonya Harding Story in her own voice”… and it’s Tonya that showed up on The Today Show and other such programs to promote the book, not the author.

I’d say all that falls into the category of things that make you go hmmmm… except, not so much. If you were the publisher, who would YOU want making the rounds to hawk this book? The relatively unknown one who wrote it, or the subject—who just happened to be part of one of the most watched showdowns in television history?

Incidentally, the publisher is relatively unknown too (World Audience, Inc.). Let me know if you’ve seen this book in any of the major chains yet—I’m curious if they are giving it any space on the shelves. Skating books get limited room as it is!

If all this talk made you think the Clip of the Day would feature Harding, the only senior ladies skater I know of that ever used Tone Loc in a competitive program… think again. I guess that’s considered innovative (to stay in line with this week’s theme), but I’d rather go with Canada’s Gary Beacom. Here’s a rare look at his amateur career from 1984 (where he finished 2nd right behind Brian Orser):

http://youtube.com/watch?v=fzCTd2QFo1k